MINNEAPOLIS -- The Minnesota Twins believe their offense is good enough to come back from almost any deficit. So as the Twins trailed by two runs when starting pitcher Kyle Gibson left Sunday's game after five innings, they still felt they had a chance against Chris Archer and the Rays.
A rocky sixth inning from Minnesota's bullpen changed that outlook just a bit.
Two Twins relievers combined to give up five runs in the sixth inning as Tampa Bay stretched its two-run lead into an 8-1 advantage. Seven-run comebacks don't happen often, even for a confident offense like Minnesota's.
As it turned out, the Twins' bullpen gave up a few more runs before it was all said and done as Minnesota dropped the series finale by an 11-3 final. Gibson took some of the blame Sunday, acknowledging he needed to get deeper into Sunday's game than the five innings he threw.
"My goal is to keep the team in the game and give us a chance to win," Gibson said. "We feel good about our offense. . . . Being down two, I don't really think that keeps us out of the game. I'm going out there and I'd like to get a couple more innings under my belt each time out there.
"Five innings is putting a lot of pressure on the pen to cover four innings like that against a pretty good team. That's probably the most frustrating part."
It was a rough day for left-hander Brian Duensing just one day after earning the victory with a one-pitch relief outing in Saturday's 6-4 victory. Duensing began the sixth inning in relief of Gibson and recorded the first out right away before running into trouble.
Duensing proceeded to serve up a one-out double to Nick Franklin, followed by a walk to Bobby Wilson. Center fielder Kevin Kiermaier drove in Franklin with a base hit to right, forcing Twins manager Paul Molitor to replace Duensing with right-hander Michael Tonkin. Evan Longoria's single to center off Tonkin scored Wilson and Kiermaier, both of which were charged to Duensing.
After allowing three runs in just one-third of an inning, Duensing's ERA swelled to 10.57, the third-highest among all major league relievers with at least seven innings of work.
"We're hoping that we can stay in the game, obviously," Twins manager Paul Molitor said. "Brian (came) out there and couldn't get through the inning, so we made a change. Tonkin, who's been pretty good, threw too many center cuts today. They got some pretty good swings off of him."
Tonkin couldn't stop the bleeding, either. After giving up the two-run single to Longoria -- which came after he hit Logan Forsythe -- Tonkin surrendered a base hit to James Loney, which scored Forsythe. Longoria later scored on a two-out single to left by David DeJesus, which capped the Rays' five-run inning and all but ended the Twins' hopes of a three-game sweep.
Trailing 8-1 in the ninth, left-hander Aaron Thompson gave up three more runs to round out what was a rough day for Minnesota's bullpen. Tampa Bay's seventh, eighth and ninth batters all scored in the ninth inning to put the Rays up 11-1.
Entering Sunday's game, Minnesota's bullpen had been in the middle of the pack among all MLB relievers. The Twins had an ERA of 3.71 out of the bullpen this year, 18th in the majors.
That number went up a bit Sunday.
"A little disappointing when you're hoping to stay in a game and you turn it over to those guys, but overall they've been very solid," Molitor said. "Today didn't work out, obviously."
Twins option Vargas to Rochester: Following Sunday's game, the Twins announced that designated hitter/first baseman Kennys Vargas has been optioned to Triple-A Rochester. In addition, Minnesota will activate infielder Eduardo Nunez from the 15-day disabled list before Tuesday's game in Pittsburgh.
Vargas began the season in the majors after debuting with the Twins last August. The 24-year-old Vargas is batting .248 with three home runs and 10 RBI in 29 games this season, but was hitting .366 with six RBI in 12 games in the month of May.
After bypassing Triple A last year following his call-up from Double-A New Britain to the Twins, this will be Vargas' first time playing for Rochester.
"Just go down and work on his game, try to take some pressure off of him," Molitor said of Vargas. "It's not uncommon for a young guy to have to go through that at some juncture. I think that's probably what's best for him in the short term. . . . I think more than mechanics right now it's more about what's in his head when he gets into the batter's box."
Nunez missed the Twins' last 17 games with a left oblique strain. He landed on the disabled list back on May 5.
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